This class is designed 1) to survey theories of how writing works and 2) to introduce writing as both a field of study and a viable career path. As such, the material we read in class covers a range of approaches, from academic scholarship to professional blogs. The calendars below outline our approach and the topics we’ll study along the way. Additionally, details about the requirements of each unit can be found on the Assignments page. And finally, a combined, detailed calendar is also available.
Readings Calendar
| Topic | Week | Author & Text |
|---|---|---|
Overview: Why Study Writing? | 1 | Elizabeth Wardle’s “You Can’t Teach Writing in General” (See Canvas > Files for print; audio version also available) and Catherine Savini’s Looking for Trouble: Finding Your Way into a Writing Assignment |
Literacy | 2 | James Paul Gee’s Literacy, discourse, and linguistics: Introduction and one of these:
|
| 3 | Selections from the Digital Archives of Literacy Narratives and Kate McKinney Maddalena’s “I need you to say ‘I’”: Why First Person is Important in College Writing | |
Discourse Communities | 4 | Jillian Grauman’s What’s That Supposed to Mean? Using Feedback on Your Writing and John Swales’ The concept of discourse community. [See Canvas > Files] |
| 5 | Penrose & Geisler’s Reading and writing without authority | |
| 6 | Elizabeth Wardle’s Identity, authority, and learning to write in new workplaces. [See Canvas > Files] | |
Process | 7 | E. Shelley Reid’s Ten Ways To Think About Writing: Metaphoric Musings for College Writing Students |
| 8 | Anne Lamott’s Shitty First Drafts [see Canvas > Files] and George Dila’s Rethinking the Shitty First Draft and Michaela Ramirez’s Writer’s Block is Easily Preventable | |
| 9 | Carol Berkenkotter’s Decisions and Revisions: The Planning Strategies of a Publishing Writer and Donald Murray’s Response of a Laboratory Rat: Or, Being Protocoled (same link) | |
| 10 | Nancy Allen, et al’s What Experienced Collaborators Say About Collaborative Writing [see Canvas > Files] and Alexus Yeakel’s Failure is Awesome | |
Technology | 11 | Ann N. Amicucci’s Four Things Social Media Can Teach You about College Writing—and One Thing It Can’t and Lottridge et al.’s The effects of chronic multitasking on analytical writing. |
| 12 | Melanie Gagich’s An Introduction to and Strategies for Multimodal Composing and Michael J. Klein & Kristi L. Shackelford’s Beyond Black on White: Document Design and Formatting in the Writing Classroom | |
Professionalism | 13 | Wiens’ I won’t hire people who use poor grammar. Here’s why and Bugan’s Being an immigrant writer in America today |
| 14 | Passell’s Stephen King’s top 20 rules for writers and Gillespie’s Becoming your own expert: Teachers as writers and Schall’s Writing the conventional résumé and Mulvey’s How to write a cover letter that gets you hired |
Assignment Calendar
| Unit | Assignment |
|---|---|
| Literacy | Literacy Narrative + 2 blog posts |
| Discourse Communities | Community Ethnography +3 blog posts |
| Process | Process Theory Paper + 4 blog posts |
| Technology | Remixed Essay + 2 blog posts |
| Professionalism | Résumé and Cover Letter + 2 blog posts |